Mark
Hunt has been pulled from his slated UFC Fight Night 121
headliner with Marcin
Tybura and the circumstances surrounding his removal are
explosive and provocative.

On Tuesday,
Ultimate Fighting Championship officials confirmed that Hunt
had been removed from main event slot after the promotion became
aware of a recent article the heavyweight contender wrote for
Australia’s Players Voice last month in which the 2001 K-1 World
Grand Prix champion admitted that he had been suffering from
worrying signs of chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE).

Hunt’s spot will be filled by former UFC heavyweight champion
Fabricio
Werdum, who needed just 65 seconds to submit Walt Harris
at UFC 216 on Oct. 7. UFC Fight Night 121 takes place Nov. 19 at
the Qudos Bank Arena in Sydney, Australia.

Hunt’s article,
entitled “If I Die Fighting, That’s Fine,” was published on
Sept. 14. In the piece, “The Super Samoan” lambastes previous
opponents and fighting contemporaries who have been caught using
performance enhancing drugs, while lamenting the money and
financial opportunities he feels he lost out on as a result of
fighting “cheaters” and “monkeys.” However, the 43-year-old, who
has spent 20 years as a professional prizefighter, opens the essay
by conceding a variety of cognitive and neurological symptoms
consistent with the early signs of CTE.

“My body is f---ed but my mind is still here. I’ve still got my
senses about me and I know what’s right and wrong, which is the
main thing,” wrote Hunt. “Sometimes I don’t sleep well. You can
hear me starting to stutter and slur my words. My memory is not
that good anymore. I’ll forget something I did yesterday but I can
remember the s--- I did years and years ago.”

“That’s just the price I’ve paid – the price of being a fighter,”
he continued. “But I’ve fought a lot of drug cheats and copped a
lot of punishment from guys who were cheating and that’s not
right.”

“Following a recent first-person article published by heavyweight
Mark
Hunt, the UFC has taken the precautionary steps of removing
Hunt from a previously announced bout in Sydney, Australia,” said
the UFC rep.

“The health-related statements made by Hunt in the article
represent the first time UFC was made aware of these claims,” they
continued. “Athlete health and safety is of the utmost importance
to the organization and it would never knowingly schedule an
athlete complaining of health issues for a fight. The organization
will require that Hunt undergo further testing and evaluations
prior to competing in any future UFC bout.”

Shortly after he was taken out of the contest, the ever-candid Hunt
hit back at the UFC and its president Dana Whit in
a profane Instagram post.

A post shared by The Super Samoan (@markhuntfighter) on Oct 10,
2017 at 4:20pm PDT

Hunt was brutally knocked out by fellow former K-1 World Grand Prix
champion Alistair
Overeem this past May but rebounded in his hometown of Auckland
in June, stopping Derrick
Lewis in a four-round slugfest.

“The Oceania Super Fighter” is also in the process of suing the UFC
pursuant to his UFC 200 loss in July 2016 to former UFC heavyweight
champion and pro-wrestling star Brock
Lesnar, who twice tested positive for the banned estrogen
blocker clomiphene. Hunt’s ongoing suit alleges that alleging the
UFC, Lesnar and Dana White committed racketeering, fraud, battery
and civil conspiracy by letting Lesnar fight with knowledge that he
was actively using banned performance enhancing substances.